Arequipa was a beautiful city with church, monastry, and some special exhibitions of the mummified Jaunita, a human sacrifice made a few centuries ago... was weird to see how small she was, a girl of 13 or so! Bit creepy, but amazing to see all the stuff she was buried with, textiles, gold, silver, sculptures... Had a lovely meal on a roof terrace overlooking the main plaza, were given ponchos coz it was cold, and with my hair in plaits I actually looked like pocahontas!!

Used Arequipa as the setting off point into the Colca canyon with a lovely guide fernando. Gorgeous hostel with an amazing view, where we tried Alpaca meat (bit like beef) from the delicious buffet, went for hikes into the canyon, met some local Quechua people, visited sacred land, had a long hike along the edge of the canyon where I was really scared coz there was a straight drop off to one side at alot of points!! Plus an amazing highlight was seeing andean condors at Condor Cross, saw at least 6, some adults and some young, an some came within 10m of our heads!! Mark went on a mountain bike ride, did all the hard work uphill, then burst the tyre and couldn't enjoy the downhll as he had to walk down with it after that!!

Back to Arequipa after few nights in the canyon, where we had our last meal with Juan and Jorge, the trainees, mark tried ostrich meat... Really liked it! Flight off to Cusco the next day...

Lara xxx